Samstag, 24. September 2016

Girls supporting Girls?

"The idea of a Queen Bee syndrome dates to research first done in the
1970s. The syndrome encompasses a set of behaviors ranging from women
disparaging typically feminine traits (“Women are soooo emotional”), to
emphasizing their own “masculine” attributes (“I think more like a
guy”), to seeing claims of gender discrimination as baseless (“The
reason there are so few women at the top is not because of
discrimination. It’s that women are just less committed to their
careers”), to being unsupportive of initiatives to address gender
inequality. The ultimate Queen Bee is the successful woman who instead
of using her power to help other women advance, undermines her women
colleagues.

(...)

For women with low levels of gender identification—who think their
gender should be irrelevant at work and for whom connecting with other
women is not important—being on the receiving end of gender bias forces
the realization that others see them first and foremost as women. And
because of negative stereotypes about women, like that they are less
competent than men, individual women can be concerned that their career
path may be stunted if they are primarily seen as just a woman and
therefore not a good fit for leadership.

To get around these kinds
of gendered barriers, these women try to set themselves apart from
other women. They do this by pursuing an individual strategy of
advancement that centers on distancing themselves from other women. One
way they do this is through displaying Queen Bee behaviors such as
describing themselves in more typically masculine terms and denigrating
other women (“I’m not like other women. I’ve always prioritized my
career”)."